3 Players RR might release ahead of IPL 2026

Rajasthan Royals (RR), the inaugural Indian Premier League (IPL) champions, had one of their toughest seasons in their 18-year history of the tournament, managing to win only four matches out of 14 in the 2025 season, which concluded earlier this month. While RR had the least number of wins in an IPL campaign this year, they still managed to finish second from bottom in the 10-team tournament, to avoid the wooden spoon, which wasn’t the case for them in the 2020 season.

After such a poor outing as a unit for RR in the IPL 2025, the player releases are bound to happen, but it will be interesting to see which will be the names the franchise is going to do away with. In this article, SportsTiger looks at three players RR might release ahead of the IPL 2026 season.

3 players RR might release ahead of IPL 2026

1. Tushar Deshpande

Tushar Deshpande was acquired by Rajasthan Royals for INR 6.50 Crore to strengthen their fast bowling stocks, but he struggled with the ball for the majority of the IPL 2025, being far too expensive for the team’s requirement. The Kalyan-born pacer played 10 matches for RR, taking nine wickets at a poor economy rate of 10.62, which is why it is likely that the team management releases him to accumulate funds for a better signing next season.

2. Shimron Hetmyer

Shimron Hetmyer was one of the most consistent batters for RR in the last IPL cycle in the finishing role, but after getting retained for a whopping INR 11 Crore contract, he wasn’t able to deliver results in the recently concluded tournament. The West Indies international failed miserably in chasing down targets time and again in the IPL 2025 season despite having decent stats, 239 runs in 14 matches at an average of 21.72 and a strike-rate of 145.73, and it could lead to RR management deciding to part ways with him ahead of the new IPL campaign.

3. Sandeep Sharma

Sandeep Sharma was retained as an uncapped player by RR for INR 4 Crore as their death bowling specialist, but he was taken to the cleaners by various batters match after match during IPL 2025, especially in the end overs of an innings, going at 9.89 economy in 10 matches before his unfortunate injury. The extra runs conceded by him and some of the other RR bowlers at the death proved to be too much for the batting unit to chase down, which meant that the team’s season got from bad to worse.